CRED: Is it fairer to be financially scored on Facebook likes, tweets, and ‘purchasing patterns’?

“Movenbank just released its financial scoring system that allows users to monitor and understand their financial data in a whole new way. This innovative real-time financial credibility score combines data from shopping patterns, daily spending and social influence into a personalized ‘CREDscore.’ … As part of their services Movenbank will provide instant real-time feedback on spending, with personalized insights that affect behavior.

Today I’ve been checking out Movenbank – in the context of social media data beginning to affect our financial statuses. The site / service is presented very much from the perspective that banks have been letting us down with the way they offer products and services, and make decisions about our credit scores, and loans, unfairly… taking this ‘out of our hands.’

Movenbank will, in contrast, develop a view of individuals based on personality, and behaviour, some of it determined by a ‘fun personality questionnaire that identifies your financial profile:’

It’s too early to judge Movenbank, and what overall, this financial services innovation will do for us. But I think it’s worth asking a few questions about the implications of tying up self-identified personality traits, social media data and shopping behaviour to our financial ‘CRED.’

How will it work? Will we get a better score from consistently buying sensible organic vegetables and pulses, rather than last minute flights to Biarritz or a gorgeous pair of Alexander McQueens? And why should we?

As I understand it credit scoring is determined by how much you have been earning, borrowing, and paying back. What do we really gain from adding social media and precise shopping activity into the mix? Will some with poor traditional credit scores be able to borrow more? Will some with good traditional credit scores, be marked down in CRED for a personality or behaviour that this new score deems dodgy in some way?

Seems to me many of our financial problems have been caused by too much credit, not too little… if this is another way of opening the gates for people deemed a ‘risk’ by other measures, to borrow… is it a step forward? And will it really be fairer for us to be financially scored on our Facebook likes, tweets, and late night impulse Amazon purchases? For our financial status to be based on what we buy, and who we are, or have constructed ourselves to be, as well as, or instead of, how much we spend, borrow and repay?